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Can't Nvidia do this without buying ARM?

A comment yesterday in the other thread mentions that ARM currently sells their ARM CPU plus Mali GPU IP in a single package. Buying the IP together is much cheaper than buying just the CPU IP. This is why nearly every ARM CPU maker uses the Mali cores, and why PowerVR as a company is nearly dead.

Reading this comment from Huang, I read it as if Nvidia wants to sell this package, but with Geforce IP instead of Mali IP.

Minor nit: Architecture and not “Package”, the latter has specific meaning. ARM defines not just instruction set, but also the architecture - Core, Memory layout, peripheral busses, etc.

Ahh, the old comcast TV+Internet is cheaper than just Internet trick....

They did, and failed:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Nvidia-to-licence-GPU-technolo...

My guess is they failed because Geforce at the time was too much of a "desktop architecture", and my guess is that it still is. But now that they own Arm they can just tell all Mali customers "take it or leave it."

A less cynical take is that they can now ask Mali customers "how can we modify this better and more mature architecture to be appropriate for your use case"

I hope this is true.

Am sad to say I'd call that take more naive more so than less cynical.

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